Affliction
by Adair In Wonderland
Summary: He was sick. And there was no God, no salvation, no cure. Light/L


**Disclaimer:** I do not own Death Note.

**Warning:** Light/L, etc.... I wrote it in the summary, so you shouldn't be shocked. Anyway, further warnings... I suppose this piece is fairly dismal. I supposed it was written in a hurry and is fairly mediocre. You have been warned!

Also, I feel I should warn you about this also. If you're reading this just for the sex, you might as well not. It's fairly non-descript. This is just rated "M" to be super, suuuuper safe, but I don't know. The line between "T" and "M" confuses me sometimes... Anyway.

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**Affliction**

_How? And why? Why?_

There was no God. There couldn't be. Of that he was sure. There was no God but himself.

Who would pull the strings to bring such an outcome? Who would twist his body into this position? It was a fact beyond dispute that the earth was a sickening place. It was repulsive. And he had always deemed himself to be above it.

So... _why?_

His first bout of nausea had left him reeling, left him on the floor staring upward, wondering how he had fallen to begin with. The ceiling was cold and white. He noted that fact while he lay unmoving on his back, his fingers pressed to his mouth as he willed his dinner to remain in his stomach.

_Cold and white... Cold and white... Just like_...

It was a hard blow. It was like a punch in the gut, another unexpected hit that landed him on his back. And, at the same time, it was just one more reason to forge ahead, one more reason to kill.

Those eyes could be endless. Day by day, they swallowed him whole, pulled him into their black depths, pulled him straight into hell. It was like looking into some mystical crystal ball. And he was drowning. His future was drowning in L's eyes.

In the morning, it would creep up on him, make every movement a painful test of strength. Under his eyes, there was a weight, a nagging burden that pulled him down, made him lethargic. If he gave into it, just let himself sink, what would happen then?

_No God but Kira._

_No God but Kira._

_No God but me._

It was his daily mantra. He found he must remind himself of his duty, his privilege and his right to rid the world of filth. If he did not, what would come? What new evil would present itself and take hold? If he could fall to it, waver for just a moment - if he could stare at the white ceiling for hours - then what would possibly happen to anyone weaker than himself?

_They would be ripped apart._

The first time he threw up, he had been so shocked that he had just sat on the bathroom floor staring at his own vomit for nearly thirty minutes. He could feel some of it clinging to his bottom lip and chin, and the sickening coldness of it nearly made him heave again. Not that it would've mattered. There was nothing left. Nothing left inside of him. He might as well have taken a knife to his gut and let all of his organs splatter onto the once pristine tile floor for the emptiness he felt.

_L._

_L._

_No God but_...

It continued. He would be sitting in that gray room, mask in place, and he would feel it rising up his throat. Minutes later, hunched over the toilet, he would raise his head slowly, eyes locking onto the small camera located in the corner of the room where the wall met the ceiling. It was a shiny black, depthless eye. As his fingers gripped the rim of the toilet seat, his slender digits wrapping around the cold porcelain almost painfully tight, he would feel a frighteningly boundless fury seize his entire being with such swiftness and violence, he was paralyzed by it. And when that passion fizzled, it left him feeling powerless.

_"Are you feeling ill, Light-kun?"_

No emotion. Ever. Every sound out of that mouth was said in the exact same tone, whether it be a request for more ridiculously sugary food or a serious conversation with a high-ranking government official. And every word that was said to him, it was all the same.

_"I'm fine."_

He could play, too. He wouldn't let his temporary sickness undo all his plans. For every drawling, impassive sentence that was thrown his way, he could throw one right back. It was how they were. Always one step ahead of each other and, therefore, eternally side by side. And it continued and continued.

It had been a day of silence. Demoralization was thick in the air. Where was Kira? Nobody knew. They would never know. L's eyes were on him. As always, watching, watching, peeling his skin right off of his bones. Sporadic clacking noises drifted in and out of his hearing. He felt lightheaded.

It was like an upheaval. He had to drag every limb, twist every joint and wrench every muscle dizzily upward just to stagger out of his chair. But that staircase was always the real test.

"Eh? Light-kun?"

The world was spinning. He looked down to see L still sitting in his chair, knees drawn up, black eyes wide with an unspoken question. He paused only for a moment and then a sickening crack echoed through the room. Somehow, everything had shifted onto its side. A great commotion filled his ears - shuffling feet and shouting coming through in intermittent bursts. Through his hazy vision, he searched for him, but when his eyes finally locked onto L's chair, it was empty. A dull, yet steadily sharpening, pain began to pierce the side of his forehead.

All he wanted to do was sleep and not think about L.

Not think about L...

About L...

A cold, white hand on the side of his face suddenly jarred him back from the darkness that had begun to gather around the corners of his vision.

"Are you alright, Light?!"

He wasn't sure who had yelled it, but he did know that it hadn't been L. The first way he knew this was because the exclamation had been full of fear and worry, spoken loudly by someone confused and distraught, which L never was. The second way he knew this was because that pale face was hovering closely above his own and those thin, bloodless lips had never moved.

_No God_...

It was later explained to him that he had fallen on the staircase, cracked his head directly on the corner of one of the steps. Blood loss had been minimal and L had assured them all that there was no reason to seek medical attention.

_"A bandage will do."_

He'd been confined to bed, like an infant, swaddled in blankets and set down to rest. As he laid there, sleepless due to the dull throbbing in his head, he set to thinking about a plan to get himself out of his current location. He needed to get away from all these useless people, useless distractions.

He needed to get away from L.

And like the devil, once summoned, he appeared. The door creaked open and the latched clicked into place, the two sounds marking his entrance, announcing his presence.

"Are you feeling better, Light-kun?"

"... Yes."

L stalked towards the bed, dragging a chair behind him which he placed near the head of the bed and assumed his usual position.

"That was quite the fall you had there. We were all very worried."

"Your concern touches me, Ryuuzaki."

L's eyes roved around the room. "Hmm. Watari has informed me that you've not been feeling well lately."

So, that eye had been watching. "It's nothing. I was just feeling a bit nauseous."

L nodded slowly, his fingers drumming softly on his knees. "You know, eating disorders are not a joke, Light-kun. They are very serious illnesses."

"E-eating disorder?!" He shot up in bed at those words, their meanings and implications sending his mind and body reeling before his sense of reason had a chance to catch up. "_You're_ the only joke here, _L_! What do you think I am?! Some girl?!"

_Disorder._

_Disorder._

_A God could only be perfect._

L's mouth hung open, his black eyes open and nearly gaping at the mess he'd become. "No... No need to yell, Light-kun."

"Well, what did you expect, saying something like that?!" He couldn't calm it, the volume in his voice, the sudden fire raging through him. There was only one outlet, one cure.

"Denial is a very common response..."

_L._

And that was it. He lunged forward, gripping L by the collar of his shirt and threw him onto the bed. "'_Denial'?!_" he screamed._ "_What am I denying, L?!" he yelled into his face, straddling his lithe body and pressing into him heavily, pushing him down against the mattress. "Tell me, 'cause I'd really like to know!"

_How... and why?_

_Why did things come to this?_

"Light-kun, what are you doing?" L asked, his voice soft due to their proximity. Those white hands had appeared and were circling the wrists that held him captive. It was all white and pristine, except for a small red spot that stood out like disease on his forehead. A stained bandage was lying somewhere in the blankets next to them.

"Your wound has come open, Light-kun..." L murmured and began to squirm underneath him, but he wouldn't have it, wouldn't allow it. _He was going nowhere._

"You know," Light drawled, craning his neck when another drop of blood landed right between L's eyes, "You really should have taken me to the hospital. I feel unwell." He moved down, positioning his forehead over L's mouth. "But you're all I have, I guess. Won't you kiss it and make it better?"

_He would make him crawl. It was the only way, the only way to make it true._

It stung - L's saliva against his cut. After the soft movement that he had commanded, he raised his head to see L's lips smeared with red and he felt so much better.

_No God but Kira._

What followed was a play for the ages. It happened often, in history, in myths, the multitudes of tales about gods descending to earth only to fall in love with mortals, to join heaven and earth for one brief moment in time. A pure tragedy.

In L, he found such heat, such resistance, yet at the same time, such immeasurable relief that he could hardly wrap his mind around it. Everything was tangled limbs, screams and gasps, pushing, pulling; another battle for dominance that he ultimately won.

_He would always win. It was a truth ordained._

The cure, he knew, lay somewhere deep inside of L. He had to first deconstruct him, reduce him to a sobbing, trembling mess before it would take effect. He held his lithe body hotly, fingernails digging into white to bring red, his face buried in his shoulder while he bit roughly at his neck.

And there was blood. So much. Wet, sticky, warm and red, red, red. Alive and pulsing.

He was sure L had gone into shock the moment he'd begun ripping off his clothes, his only attempts at resistance disorganized and so ridiculously futile. He'd never heard the stoic man scream, never felt him shiver, never seen him _bleed_. There was a beauty to it - a life-affirming, soul-awakening beauty.

When he found it, got as deep inside the other man's body as was humanly possible, he slumped forward bonelessly, his orgasm leaving him to revel in the wake of its brilliance.

_And what was left now?_

_God in heaven, what was left?_

So alive. He felt so alive. Removing himself, lifting himself from atop the other, yet still remaining, knees on either side of pale body beneath him, he looked down at what he'd done. Bite marks, scratches, laced with blood, adorned L's frame. It was all mixed with sweat and tears and semen and his white, white skin and for a moment - a brief yet lingering moment - Light felt as though he was a God already and that paradise had been built, laid out before him.

"I'm Kira, you know. Of course I am. Who else could it be? _Who?!_"

Silence. Acceptance of defeat. He heard it as clearly as every answerless question ringing through his mind.

_What now?_

He felt it and his body went rigid. His mind, in a torrent, constructed a wall, spat out denial of the stinging in his throat as though that would stop it. But, of course, it would not. He jumped off the bed, his feet pounding against the floor in their fury, and violently wrenched open the door to the bathroom. As he ran to the toilet, he caught a brief glimpse of himself in the mirror. In that smooth, glassy surface, he saw reflected back at him an unfamiliar savage - naked, eyes red, lips dry, an open wound pouring blood down the side of his face.

_There was no God at all._

He vomited, retched out the few contents of his stomach, holding desperately onto the porcelain bowl as though it would save him, bring him salvation. As the burning subsided and he gazed wearily and blindly forward, the subtle sounds of L's shallow breathing reached him and played mockingly through his head.

_If only... If only the world had been a better place..._

He slumped forward, defeated, resting his head on his forearm and cried. Hot tears mixed with the cold, sticky blood that was drying up on the side of his face, cutting trails through it and washing it away. L was approaching. He could hear shaky footsteps, could hear the door slowly creaking open. He was overcome with an urge to get up and embrace him, to beg for forgiveness, to run his hands through his messy hair and see him smile.

_It was but a dream._

He didn't move. L's voice was ringing through the small room, bouncing off every tile and wall. His head was hung in mourning. He was sick - so unbearably, humanly sick - and there wasn't a god in heaven or on earth that could cure him now.

**END**

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Thanks for reading... I hope you liked it...

Anyway... I'm sorry to anyone who's reading my multi-chapter DN fic right now. I'll get around to it one of these days! I promise!! I was just laying in bed one night, and this idea hit me, and I really wanted to write it, so... there ya go. (I've been tryin' to get back into my fanfiction lately... We'll see how it goes...)

This thing here... kinda fell apart as I was writing it, but, I hope it makes sense. I know what I'm trying to say, at least. I mean, it seems like pretty standard (sadly) DN psychobabble, amirite? So. Yeah.

Anyway. Reviews!! Please and thank you! Tell me whatcha think, alright? ^_^


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